Thanks Brendan for a fun puzzle that was quite tricky in places – I’m still unsure on some parsing. edit: thanks to Balfour, muffin, and others in the comments!
There are SIX CHARACTERS and their authors in the grid: TESS (HARDY); EMMA (AUSTEN); ALICE (CAROLL); Oliver TWIST (Dickens); KANGA and ROO (MILNE) – edit: and see AlanC and other commenters for more e.g. Pirandello linked to SIX CHARACTERS in search of an author, which can describe the rest of the theme
| ACROSS | ||
| 9 | GLADIATOR |
Old fighter happy I reversed schedule (9)
|
| GLAD=”happy” + I (from surface) + ROTA=”schedule” reversed | ||
| 10 | MILNE |
The writer’s penning line as children’s author (5)
|
| definition: A. A. Milne the author of the Winnie-the-Pooh stories
MINE=belonging to the writer=”The writer’s”; around/penning L (line) |
||
| 11 | DOGMA |
Blind faith in a male deity? Just the opposite (5)
|
| A (from surface) + M (male) + GOD=”diety”; all reversed/”Just the opposite” | ||
| 12 | REHEARING |
Trying afresh, male gets absorbed in parental task (9)
|
| for the definition, “trying” as in a trial in court
HE=”male” inside REARING=”parental task” |
||
| 13 | ABRIDGE |
Prior to game of cards, a cut (7)
|
| BRIDGE=”game of cards”, with A (from surface) going in front/”Prior” | ||
| 14 | DICKENS |
Author named in expression of surprise (7)
|
| reference to the expression of surprise ‘What the Dickens?’ | ||
| 17 | TROLL |
Republican in charge producing offensive poster (5)
|
| R (Republican) inside TOLL=”charge” | ||
| 18 | SIX |
Backed team’s long shot (3)
|
| definition: in cricket, a ‘six’ is a shot that travels a long distance to land beyond the boundary, i.e. a “long shot”
XI’S=”team’s” (as XI = eleven = team); reversed/backed |
||
| 19 | ALICE |
Celia’s name-change? (5)
|
| anagram of (Celia)* | ||
| 21 | CARROLL |
Lewis, Oxford don and writer (7)
|
| not sure if there’s more to this: the surface can describe Lewis CARROLL
thanks to muffin: the surface can mislead if one reads ‘Lewis’ as referring to C S Lewis |
||
| 23 | ARABIAN |
Befuddled brain taking in article after article from part of Asia (7)
|
| anagram/”Befuddled” of (brain)*, taking in A (indefinite article); after A (indefinite article) | ||
| 24 | APPARATUS |
Short piece of text in suitable American structure (9)
|
| PARA (short for paragraph, “Short piece of text”) inside APT=”suitable”; plus US (American) | ||
| 26 | TWIST |
Squeeze using spades in dummy (5)
|
| S (short for spades, in playing cards); inside TWIT=”dummy”
surface reading could describe a play in the card game bridge |
||
| 28 | HARDY |
Robust half of comic duo (5)
|
| reference to the comic duo Laurel and Hardy | ||
| 29 | OVERRATES |
Test data? Assesses excessively (9)
|
| in cricket (i.e. perhaps in a cricket “Test” match), OVER RATES is a statistic (i.e. “data”) that can be measured for teams when bowling | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 1 | AGED |
Old or modern artist endlessly showing up (4)
|
| Edgar DEGA-[s]=”modern artist”, without the end letter, and reversed “up” | ||
| 2 | KANGAROO |
Kind of court that proceeds by leaps and bounds (8)
|
| reference to ‘kangaroo court’; or the animal that leaps and bounds | ||
| 3 | PIRANDELLO |
Italian playwright’s storyline mostly about Ireland, oddly (10)
|
| PLO-[t]=”storyline mostly”; around anagram/”oddly” of (Ireland)* | ||
| 4 | STERNE |
Serious English or Irish novelist (6)
|
| definition: Laurence Sterne the novelist
STERN=”Serious” + E (English) |
||
| 5 | ORTHODOX |
Dorothy’s largely wrong steer, as usual (8)
|
| anagram/”wrong” of most of the letters/”largely” from (Doroth-[y])*; plus OX=”steer”=a young bull | ||
| 6 | EMMA |
Novel part of proof putting off learner at first (4)
|
| definition: the novel by Jane Austen
[L]-EMMA=”part of proof” in maths; without the first letter of L-[earner] |
||
| 7 | ALPINE |
A large tree or plant (6)
|
| definition: a type of plant species
A (from surface) + L (large) + PINE=”tree” |
||
| 8 | BERG |
Floating object waterbird’s almost turned over (4)
|
| definition: as in ice berg
almost all the letters from GREB-[e]=”waterbird”; reversed/”turned over” |
||
| 13 | ATTIC |
Like part of ancient Greece that’s accessible by flights? (5)
|
| ATTIC as in ‘of Attica’, the region around Athens in ancient Greece; or an attic in a building, accessed via flights of stairs | ||
| 15 | CHARACTERS |
People as created initially in books (10)
|
| initial letters of A-[s] C-[reated]; inside CHARTERS=hires/leases=”books” as a verb | ||
| 16 | STEIN |
Author’s a mug, used to drink a lot (5)
|
| Gertrude STEIN the author; or a stein can mean a very large cup | ||
| 18 | SOLUTION |
Process yielding mixed results is what you seek (8)
|
| solution as in the process of mixing things together e.g. dissolving something in a liquid; or a solution is what the crossword solver seeks | ||
| 20 | INITIATE |
Launch minimal review of restaurant (8)
|
| a minimal review of a restaurant could be: IN IT, I ATE | ||
| 22 | REPORT |
Write for newspaper about position of left wing (6)
|
| RE=regarding, concerning=”about”; plus PORT=left hand side (of e.g. an aircraft)=”position of left wing” | ||
| 23 | AUSTEN |
English author sharing pronouncement with state capital (6)
|
| Jane Austen, the English author, has a name that shares its pronunciation with ‘Austin’, the state capital of Texas | ||
| 24 | ASHY |
A pale cast? Just the opposite (4)
|
| A (from surface) + SHY=”cast” to give ASHY=”pale”
I think “Just the opposite” indicates that it is ‘a’ + ‘cast’ to give ‘pale’, rather than ‘a’ + ‘pale’ to give ‘cast’ |
||
| 25 | RAYS |
Fish farm, so to speak (4)
|
| sounds like (so to speak): ‘raise’=”farm” | ||
| 27 | TESS |
Tragic heroine, as Dickinson, say, quaintly concludes (4)
|
| definition refers to the character from Thomas Hardy’s Tess of the D’Urbervilles
not sure of the parsing – help please! edit thanks to Balfour: Emily Dickinson could, quaintly, be described as a poetess, which ends/concludes in the solution TESS |
Manehi, I got a bit more carried away than you but your SIX CHARACTERS are spot on. Brendan on top form and with a bit of googling for the more obscure, there is MILNE/Now We Are SIX/KangaROO (a reminder of a Brockwell SOLUTION yesterday), PIRANDELLO/SIX CHARACTERS In Search Of An Author, DICKENS/TWIST, CARROLL/ALICE, HARDY/TESS, AUSTEN/EMMA, STEIN/The Autobiography of ALICE B Toklas. I also enjoyed APPARATUS, ORTHODOX, ATTIC and the excruciating but amusing INITIATE.
Ta Brendan & manehi.
Is it deliberate or just happy coincidence that 17/13 across gives a troll under abridge?
Thanks manehi. I couldn’t parse TESS either. I was also unsure about AGED as I don’t consider Degas a modern artist.
We saw our second concealed rota in two days.
I didn’t know lemma. My favourite was INITIATE.
Thanks Brendan and manehi
CARROLL could have been in the Quick – I’m guessing that the only misdirection is that one might think of C S Lewis.
I saw the theme and wasted time trying to find works by STERNE and STEIN!
I didn’t parse CHARACTERS or TESS.
27d – Emily Dickinson was a ‘poeTESS’ – an arguably ‘quaint’ term which concludes with the answer.
If ALICE is two characters, to go with CARROLL and Gertrude STEIN (ALICE B Toklas), and we have both KANGA and ROO to go with MILNE, then together with EMMA, TESS and TWIST, doesn’t that give us seven?
Comment #7
Even I couldn’t miss the theme today,though I didn’t spot all of the references / connections. Good fun and a helpful blog _ thanks both.
At first sight, I thought this would be impenetrable (like yesterday’s, for me) but once I saw the literary theme, it all flowed nicely and was very enjoyable. I knew all of the authors and characters; I got PIRANDELLO straightaway and the rest followed. I liked HARDY and KANGAROO too.
Balfour @5: well done, that was a real head scratcher.
Dickinson was a poet, or quaintly concluded ‘poetess’.
Agree with Muffin about C S Lewis – that’s who I first thought of when reading the clue
Despite my uncertainty (@6) as to whether there were SIX or seven CHARACTERS, I thought this was great as usual from Brendan, whose puzzles always have something clever going on.
muffin @4: yes, these days Brendan does occasionally go for clues that seem to verge on the non-cryptic. I wondered if the intended misdirection in CARROLL was to do with Lewis the sidekick of Morse? Probably not!
Very enjoyable. Many thanks Brendan and manehi.
Surely PIRANDELLO’s Six Characters in Search of an Author IS the theme, not merely part of it?!
Balfour @5
Well done on TESS, but I feel sure that “poetess” isn’t in the Guardian style guide!
Lord Jim @13: I also toyed with Morse’s long-suffering sidekick as well as CS Lewis. Good thinking Bingy. @14.
I was also looking for a Sterne character and wondered if 24d could be read as “(A) S H and Y”? It would be appropriately hard to pin down.
Many thanks to Brendan and manehi
I only became aware of Pirandello in the first place due to the Goon Show episode entitled ‘Six Charlies in Search of an Author’. Thanks, Brendan and manehi.
They’re becoming tricky lately.
CARROLL is ridiculous.
muffin @15. I’m sure you’re correct. However, less than 20 years ago, my daughters, attending a selective Grammar School, were being taught out of a primer called ‘First Aid in English’ which still had a list of ‘masculine’ nouns and their ‘feminine’ equivalents. ‘Poet’ and ‘poetess’ were featured, along with many others which would not get past the G’s style guide.
The theme was clever and interesting and I liked it, but most of the setter’s efforts seem to have gone into creating that grid, and some of the individual clues didn’t match it for ingenuity (unless I have missed something, which with Brendan is always a possibility). Apart from the chance of picking the wrong Lewis, what is cryptic about CARROLL? DICKENS isn’t much harder, and if TESS depends on Emily Dickinson being a poeTESS, it’s a bit of a stretch (no, I didn’t parse that one, so it’s probably sour grapes). Lots of people in the Guardian comments describing it as “gentle”, and quite a bit of it was.
(MickS@2: it’s Brendan, so the troll under a bridge is probably deliberate. Well spotted.)
Thanks, I didn’t realise the full extent of the theme and didn’t think of CS Lewis either which made me hesitate to put in CARROLL without the crossers. LOI was TESS which I had to come back to for the parsing.
Thank you manehi and Brendan, super crossword, really enjoyed it. I didn’t get SIX, which was a pity, no? And quite a few others I struggled with. IN IT I ATE – 🤣 Much more on my level than the last couple of days. Have a good weekend!
Thanks manehi. Brendan’s on top form with this theme. Perhaps, in view of the digressive nature of his best-known work, STERNE could be considered an author in search of a character?
I loved this. The theme didn’t become completely apparent until I got CHARACTERS, which was about 3/4 of the way through. I wrote a paper about SIX CHARACTERS In Search of an Author for a seminar in grad school, so I should have twigged to it once I had PIRANDELLO and SIX. But unfortunately my solve today was interrupted by a nap, which meant I wasn’t focused on the big picture for a while in there. Anyway, a brilliant bit of work. Like others, I was hoping, say, SHANDY would appear.
I doubt if Alice B. Toklas was intended as a character. The book is more or less nonfiction–Toklas was Stein’s life partner–so calling her a character seems a little off.
Balfour @20 I remember that book very well and a lot longer than 20 years ago !
Another impressive grid fill from Brendan. I liked the American APPARATUS, Dorothy’s ORTHODOX, and IN IT I ATE (LOL, has this been done before?).
Thanks Brendan and manehi.
While the theme is very powerful as usual, my GK failed me on this one, so I had to use Google to figure out the “six characters” theme and some of the authors. I’m not convinced by any defense of CARROLL; yes, both of them are described by the clue, so one needs to choose one based on the grid; where’s the wordplay? INITIATE has been seen a few times. Other than that, a terrific puzzle; thanks Brendan and manehi!
[For those unfamiliar with Pirandello: Six Characters is by far his most famous play. The other big one is Henry IV, which is about a man who thinks he is Holy Roman Emperor Henry IV (or maybe he’s only pretending to think that); I actually like that one a bit better. Also worth a read is the novel The Late Mattia Pascal, which (since it’s right there in the title) it isn’t a spoiler to say is about a man who discovers he’s presumed dead, and uses this as an opportunity to reinvent himself.]
Robi @27 – yes, INITIATE has almost acquired chestnut status. See, for example, Matilda on June 7th last year: ‘Start talking about the restaurant I went to last night?’
Nice puzzle, clever collection of theme entries. Liked SIX, kind of surprising.
The pairing with ALICE made CARROLL a bit more understandable, but it still seems a bit lacking cryptically. The suggestion that if you think of the wrong association (CS Lewis) you’ll be lead astray doesn’t seem to quite cut it. [By contrast, yesterday’s “car men” clue had two wordplays and no definition. What is this world coming to?]